


Consumed

by BlueVase



Category: Call the Midwife
Genre: F/M, I decided there was such a thing as fairies interacting with turnadette, Pining, once upon a time far in au land, things get steamier as they progress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-04-27
Packaged: 2019-04-06 21:12:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14065671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueVase/pseuds/BlueVase
Summary: Sister Bernadette discovers that her cough is not so much due to TB as due to something else: a latent power inside her that no longer wants to stay dormant.TW: none





	1. Chapter 1

**Thanks to@purple-roses-words-and-love for being my beta once again.**

Overall, the birth has gone well. The baby came swiftly, and the mother only needed a few stitches. No haemorrhaging , no need for a mucus-extractor. The newest addition to the population of Poplar screamed his head off as soon as he slipped from between his mother’s legs, slick as a selkie.

“Never again,” his mother said, wiping tears from her cheeks. Her pain seems forgotten now as she cradles the newborn in her arms, tracing the soft curve of its cheek with fingers that only moments ago were clenched in agony.

 _Then why don’t I share her elation?_ Sister Bernadette asks herself as she packs away her instruments in her bag.

“Isn’t he beautiful, Doctor?” the patient asks without tearing her eyes away from her son’s face.

“He’s a strapping baby boy,” Doctor Turner concurs.

Sister Bernadette does her best not to look at him. She tries to train her eyes on the pastel bedsheets, but she still sees the doctor move from the corner of her eye. She tries to smell nothing but the starch of her wimple and amniotic fluid mixed with the sharp tang of blood, and yet the scent of his Henley’s and soap seems to overpower it all. She tries to focus on the metal in her hands, so cold when she touched it first, now lukewarm due to the heat of her skin, but all she seems to feel is the ghost of his hand where it brushed hers.

She wishes he’d just leave, but he seems enraptured by the child, and oblivious to her discomfort, so she excuses herself for a moment and steps out of the bedroom. Her feet carry her out of the apartment, out of the flat, into the outside air. She leans against a dirty brick wall, knowing the soot will stain her habit but unable to really care, and sighs.

She places a hand over her chest. Her heartbeat is fast and fluttering. “Dear God, give me strength,” she prays. She is slightly out of breath.

She had hoped that this delivery would take her mind off of things. But because the woman was an elderly prima gravida, Sister Bernadette had no choice but to call Doctor Turner. After all, she lives to serve, and the birthing room is no place for her personal preferences. The safety of her patient is all that matters, and the last thing Sister Bernadette needed were complications. But then Doctor Turner’s presence hadn’t been necessary after all, and he sat in a chair as she worked, ready to help but loath to intervene when there was no need.

Had his eyes been on her all the time, or had she imagined it? Perhaps his gaze means nothing; Doctor Turner knew how to appreciate skilled labour, and would enjoy watching a professional at work any time.

But what if his gaze does signify something? What if he was looking at her, drinking her in?

Her heart beats a painful tattoo in her chest. In her lungs something coils. She scrapes her throat to get rid of the tickle that itches there. She has a slight headache. It’s no wonder, with all the ill people she sees on a daily basis. It’s probably a common cold. If it becomes something worse, she’ll simply ask Doctor Turner to give her a prescription.

 _He’s always there, no matter in what direction I steer my thoughts,_ she thinks, and rubs her forehead. Is she feverish, or just blushing because she can’t stop thinking of him? At one point during the delivery it looked as if his help was needed after all, and he rolled up his sleeves to help her. She saw that his arms were dusted with dark hair, and wondered if it would be soft as down or coarser. She’s never wanted to touch a man like that, just for herself, before. If it was a fleeting thought, it would not have been so confusing.

She is sick of this constant uncertainty, but there is no way out of it, or if there is, she can’t find it.

“You did well, Sister,” a deep voice says.

She opens her eyes and smiles a little at the form of the doctor beside her. He still has his sleeves rolled up, exposing his pale arms with that dark hair to the little rays of dying sun that manage to fall between the tall buildings.

“Thank you, Doctor,” she says, tearing her eyes away from his arms, letting them slide over his hands. His knuckles sprout the same dark hair. She suppresses the thoughts that come unbidden about what such hands must feel like when they touch her, any part of her.

“I don’t think I can offer you a drag?” he says, lighting one of his trusted Henley’s. She has taken a wee puff of one of his cigs before, but though the thought of closing her lips around the bud that he has wetted with his tongue is more tantalising than she’d ever care to admit, she doesn’t think her lungs would thank her. They feel tight, strange.

“No, thank you,” she murmurs, and coughs a little. Something inside her lungs seems to rattle.

“That’s a nasty cough you have there, Sister,” Doctor Turner says. He has knitted his eyebrows in concern. His features are hazy through the curling smoke.

“It’s nothing,” she says.

“Are you sure? You’re looking a bit peaky if I may say so.”

“I’m perfectly fine.” But talking makes something coil inside her, and her throat tickles so much that she has to cough to rid herself of the feeling.

“With all due respect, Sister, but you don’t sound at all well to me. How long have you been coughing?” His hand hovers over her arm; she can feel the heat of his palm through the navy fabric of her habit.

“On and off for the past few days. It’s really nothing.”

He places his hand on her forehead. She shivers under his touch, has to consciously will herself not to melt against him. Her lungs burn.

“You have a slight temperature. I’ll take you back to clinic, and I’ll…” he starts.

Panic blossoms inside her. He can’t take her with him in his car, can’t focus all his attention on her.

“Dinna fash yerself, Doctor,” she snaps, falling back on her native Scottish, using her mother’s stern words because she has none of her own. “I am fine,” she adds when he lets his hand fall. “Just a wee cold. Nothing a good night’s sleep and plenty of vitamins won’t cure.”

He seems ready to argue, but she knows he respects her too much to keep pestering her. “If you are sure…”

 _I love him,_ she thinks.

She could kiss him in that moment, would do anything to take the heartbreak out of his voice. Instead she doubles over as another bout of coughing racks her body. It feels as if something inside her snaps and breaks away. It claws its way up her throat, leaving red ribbons of hurt. Tears pool in her eyes, drip on the pavement. She hacks till she sees black spots. The taste of pennies blooms on her tongue.

She’s dimly aware of Doctor Turner talking to her, of him rubbing her back, but she can’t respond just yet.

And then something slithers out of her mouth, falls from between her lips, into the palm of her hand.

She looks at it in her horror, her stomach curling up on itself like a hand balling into a fist.

“Sister, did you just spit out some kind of worm?” Doctor Turner asks, his voice more shaky than she has ever heard before.

It isn’t a worm. The thing resembles a thread or a ribbon. It glows softly, and wriggles a little, smearing her fingers with blood and saliva.

She has heard about these things in tales, but has never seen one in real life. How could she? They only exist in fairy stories.

She shakes her head and looks up at Doctor Turner. Black spots still dance in her vision, and she feels as if she might faint.

“It’s not a parasite, Doctor,” she whispers. Her throat is raw.

“You know what it is?” he asks.

She nods. “It’s a spell.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eternal gratitude for my ever loyal beta!

“A spell?” Doctor Turner asks. He furrows his eyebrows further, his hand still between her shoulder blades. The heat of his palm seeps into her habit, through her slip, and warms her clammy skin.

“An enchantment,” Sister Bernadette agrees. Her lungs and throat feel as if someone has been at them with a cheese grater. She wipes her mouth with the back of her left hand. With her right, she does her utmost best to keep hold of the spell that crawled its way up from some unknown place inside of her. It is slick and slippery, and she has to dig her nails into its twisting body to make sure it doesn’t slither to the ground.

 _What does this mean?_ Part of her thinks she must be dreaming. There is no such thing as magic, and there certainly isn’t any inside of her. But her mother told her stories every night before she died, and those stories were chockfull of the Wee Folk spitting spells into being, of spinning them from spit and words and need.

“Sister, you are unwell,” Doctor Turner says. His words snap her out of her reverie and back into the present.

“I feel better already,” she whispers. It isn’t a complete lie; the need to cough up her lungs has ceased.

“There’s no such thing as spells outside of fairy tales. I don’t know what it is you’ve coughed up, but we must take you to hospital right away. I think it must be some kind of worm, some kind of parasite, or a bit of tissue…”

Normally she’d tremble at the concern that laces his voice, but now his refusal to listen to her makes her angry. She’s already exasperated with him, but mainly with herself. Her voice doesn’t sound like her own when she snaps, “It’s a spell, I’ve told you!” She takes out a handkerchief and spits saliva and blood into it. The taste of it makes her want to gag.

He opens his mouth, and for one moment, she thinks he’ll wag his finger at her and tell her she’s not in her right mind, running a temperature and all that, but he does nothing of the sort. Instead he says, “No matter what it is, it can’t be good.” He increases the pressure of his hand between her shoulders to try and get her to move, but she is rooted to the spot, her heart beating so hard it feels like a battering ram assaulting her ribs.

“I don’t need to go to hospital,” she says.

His hand travels to her lower back as he tries to steer her towards his car. A shiver runs along her spine, and her hand twitches open involuntarily, causing the red ribbon-like enchantment to fall to the ground. She cries out and reaches for it, but it is damnably fast, and slithers out of reach.

“Don’t let it get away!” Doctor Turner shouts, and falls to his knees with a grunt, the rip he mended in his trousers tearing and gaping open, the torn stitches like teeth. The bit of leg she can see is dusted with dark hair, too. She wonders just how much of him is covered with that sensuous black hair, then chastises herself for thinking such a lurid thing.

“Don’t touch it!” Sister Bernadette says, and tries to bat his hand away whilst simultaneously trying to grab the spell dancing between their fingers. It glistens with her drying saliva and blood like a snake. It’s fast as a serpent, too. She can’t let it touch Doctor Turner, no matter what happens. She doesn’t know what kind of spell it is, never mind that she seems to have cast it, and she can’t possibly predict the effect it might have on him were it to touch him. No, she should wind it around her hand and pull it taut till it frays and ultimately snaps. This is one of the few ways she knows of breaking a spell.

 _Or a kiss,_ she thinks. But though the Anglican church condones physical contact between nuns and laymen when necessary in a professional capacity, she doesn’t think they would be very happy with contact of this kind.

_Especially not since it would be more than an innocent kiss to make him better._

She makes a mad dash for the spell and manages to catch it between two fingers, but the thing gives a smart twist and slithers from her grip. It curls past Doctor Turner’s crushed Henley, between the loop of his shoelaces.

“Don’t let it touch you!” Sister Bernadette cries out. Her lungs burn from exertion, making every breath agony. She pushes her own hurt down, takes a deep breath, and lunges for the enchantment, batting it away from his shoe. The spell twists around her hand and launches itself at the doctor. He instinctively raises his hands. The spell hits just above his wrist. Before he can wriggle his finger underneath and flick it off, it sinks inside his skin.

“No!” Sister Bernadette whimpers. She feels sick in every fibre of her being, her stomach having shrunken to the size of a walnut.

He pats his wrist frantically, raking his skin with his fingernails, leaving white lines that turn pink. When it becomes clear there is nothing he can do, he lets his hand fall to his side. He looks up till he meets Sister Bernadette’s eyes.

“So what do we do now?” he asks.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Thanks to@purple-roses-words-and-love for betaing.**

“So what do we do now?” he asks.

A multitude of thoughts swirl in her head. There’s iron to burn it out of him, a combination of fennel and mustard seeds to make him vomit it up... And there’s another method that makes her knot her hands in her stomach to still the butterflies that roam there.

Sister Bernadette shakes the wrinkles out of her skirt, and wipes the dust from the navy fabric. “We can’t stay here. We must go somewhere private.”

“There’s no one at the surgery,” Doctor Turner says. He’s still patting his arm and wrist, pressing his skin with his fingertips to feel for the spell. He won’t find it there; it will travel through his bloodstream, most likely, and try and burry itself inside of him.

 _If only I knew what kind of spell it was…_ Sister Bernadette thinks, then pushes the thought away. There is no time for  _ifs_ and  _maybes._ She must act, and do it swiftly, before the spell has time to properly wind itself around Doctor Turner’s bones, or knit itself in his flesh. How long until a spell takes effect? She can’t remember. She’s still feeling light-headed, and nauseous.

“The surgery it is, then,” Sister Bernadette decides. She rolls her soiled handkerchief into a ball, and puts it in her pocket. She doesn’t want to sit next to Doctor Turner in his car, is afraid she’ll feel the warmth of his leg as it rests so close to hers, but it is not as if she has much of a choice here. It’s not about her wishes anymore, in any case.

They go inside to make sure mother and baby are still doing well, and to collect their bags. Sister Bernadette presses the hand of Poplar’s newest mother, and promises that she’ll come to see her tomorrow. She does it mechanically, her thoughts too focussed at the problem at hand to be more than friendly in a somewhat detached manner.

Doctor Turner has parked his car in the alley next to the apartment building. The machine is a dark green, and gleams like the shell of a beetle.  _He polishes it regularly,_ Sister Bernadette realises. The thought unfurls in her heart, causing a little twinge of something she can’t name. Here is a man who rarely ever takes time out of his day to eat properly, yet he washes the mud and filth of Poplar from his car’s bonnet, sponges the hubcaps till they glitter like water.

Doctor Turner holds the door open for her. She seats herself. The inside of the car smells of Henleys and shaving soap and leather. It’s a deeply masculine scent that startles her a little, used as she is to the different smells of starch, incense, and perfume.

Doctor Turner sits down behind the wheel, and guns the engine. They drive without speaking for a few minutes. In the end, it is he who clears his throat. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you. I’m not entirely sure I believe you now, but it is harder to remain incredulous when a… spell, or enchantment, or whatever it may be somehow forces itself into your body without leaving so much as an entrance wound.” His voice is soft, the words chosen carefully.

“It’s all right,” she murmurs, turning her face to the window. The houses of Poplar zip past. The sun has dipped almost below the horizon. Darkness is rolling in from the East, making it harder to see through the glass. Instead, she sees her own face reflected vaguely, like a ghost.

“It’s not all right, but I am grateful to you for saying it is.”

“Some people need to see to believe,” she says.

He chuckles. “Do you think I’m one of those?”

She blushes, and presses her knees together, focussing on the bones touching through layers of muscle, skin, and fabric. “Some people need to see certain things to believe, but not others,” she rectifies herself. She sits a little straighter, and places her hands on her knees to give them something to do rather than twitch in her lap. She dislikes it when they flutter like moths, but she can’t let them lie still, because that doesn’t feel natural, either. She curls and uncurls them, a nail catching on her black stocking every once in a while.

They arrive at the surgery. The doctor parks his car so badly at first that he takes up two parking spaces. He has to back out, and do it again. The car doesn’t sit entirely straight between the white lines after the second try, but neither of them can bring up the patience for him to try it a third time. Instead, they get out, clutching their bags and entering the surgery with large strides. Sister Bernadette’s shoes click on the tiles as if they are stiletto heels rather than thick-soled monstrosities that always look scuffed no matter how often she brings out the shoe polish. She inhales deeply, wincing at the sharp scent of antibacterial soap that burns her still-sensitive lungs.

They move to the kitchen without speaking. Doctor Turner lets the tap run, rolling up his sleeves so he can soap up his wrists. He touches the place where the spell has entered him, but there is nothing to see there. Sister Bernadette averts her eyes and hands him the slick bar of soap. Her hands tremble, and his fingers are not as steadfast as usual, either. Her fingers skirt over his wrist, touching the black hair, finding that it is soft like the hair of a newborn now that it is wet.

She almost drops the soap, and apologises.

“We’re both a little jittery,” Doctor Turner says in a valiant effort to brush her shame under the carpet.

He takes her to his office. The lights are still on, throwing orange pools on the floor.

 _He still hasn’t asked me about my magic,_ she thinks as she puts her bag on his desk. Is it because there is still a part in him that is hesitant to believe, or because to ask would be to invite her to talk about her childhood? Nuns are not supposed to have a past that stretches further than the moment they entered the novitiate.

Doctor Turner clears his throat, and leans against his desk, half sitting down on it. He taps his fingertips against each other. “So, how does one get rid of a spell?” he asks.

She takes off her glasses and polishes them, studying him through her lashes. He’s a blurry smear now, but she can see the red ribbon coil in his lungs, floating almost sensually, beckoning her. She has realised what she needs to do from the moment the spell entered him, and both fears and longs for it.

“You mustn’t laugh,” she whispers, wiping the same bit of glass over and over again.

“Why would I laugh?”

“Because it’s a kiss. To get the enchantment out of you, I’ll need to kiss you.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to @purple-roses-words-and-love for being my beta as usual!

“A kiss?” Doctor Turner asks. He utters the words very carefully, as if they’re porcelain marbles and they’ll break if he pushes them out of his mouth too fast.

“It’s that or burning it out of you with iron,” she says, wishing she wouldn’t blush so fiercely, wishing she wouldn’t sound so defensive.

“Well, the kiss surely sounds like the better alternative,” Doctor Turner quips, and laughs a little. The sound dies quickly, and he clears his throat. “But you are a nun, Sister Bernadette. A kiss is a very intimate thing. If you prefer not to, if you feel it compromises your vows…”

“I’m a nurse as well as a nun, Doctor, and it’ll be in that capacity that this kiss is given.” _Not as a lover, never as a lover…_

Her traitorous heart has sped up so much that she’s somewhat breathless. She wipes her hands on her habit and puts her glasses back on, training her eyes on his hands so she doesn’t have to look at his face. There are veins visible just underneath the skin.

 _The hands of a labourer,_ she thinks. Will he cup her face with those hands when they kiss, or will he let one rest on her hip? Maybe he won’t do anything of the sort, and let them dangle at his sides, minimising their physical contact.

“Well, if you have no objections, I think we must do it quickly. I don’t know much about magic, but I suppose it’s best if we get this spell out of me as soon as possible,” he says, and stands. His knees pop.

“It’s best, yes. The spell hasn’t had time to settle yet, so extracting it will be relatively easy.” She stares up at him. He looks pale, and fiddles with his tie. He swallows, causing his Adam’s apple to bob down and then up again.

“Let’s do it now, then,” he says. His voice has become deep, a little hoarse.

“I… I’m sorry it has to be like this, Doctor Turner,” she whispers.

“I’m not… at least, don’t be sorry for my sake,” he says, and turns a little red. She smiles, and puts her glasses on the desk. It’ll be easier if she can’t see him, easier to kiss him without the metal frame in the way, easier to see the spell when it’s the only thing that isn’t a blur.

They move together a little awkwardly, he still trying to be proper, she squinting to make out his shape.

“Have you done this before?” he asks. She doesn’t know if he’s referring to her extracting a spell, or kissing a man. She shakes her head; the answer is ‘no’ either way.

“Well, there’s not much to it. To the kissing, that is. I don’t know about dragging out rogue enchantments. But there’s nothing to be afraid of concerning the kiss.”

“I’m not afraid,” she says, and she isn’t. What makes her hands tremble is anticipation, not fear.

Doctor Turner gives her his hand, the one attached to the wrist the spell used to enter him. For one horrible moment, she’s afraid she hasn’t explained it properly, that he expects she simply has to kiss his hand and not his mouth. Then, he caresses the back of her hand with his thumb, lacing their fingers together. She brings his hand to her lips, and kisses the dry skin there anyway. She’s right; it’s easier without glasses, without having to see every tiny expression flit over his face.

Is he shocked at her boldness? She’s shocked herself. A little voice cries out that this is sin, surely it is, because his thumb sliding over her lips and dipping between them so she can touch it with the tip of her tongue is NOT a medical necessity. But she has to trust herself with him, has to be comfortable with his body before she can kiss him properly. It’s not as if his hand stays at her mouth, either; instead, it cups her cheek, draws her closer.

Her breath hitches. She has to stand on tiptoes to reach his face. Doctor Turner is bending his knees slightly so their mouths can meet. She’d be lying if she said she’d never imagined kissing his lips, but she’s never imagined it like this. His mouth is dry at first, but as he opens to her, it grows wet and warm. His tongue touches her lips. She opens willingly, inhaling his breath into her lungs.

His non-dominant hand twitches at his side. He hasn’t used it to touch her. He’s leaning back a little. She suddenly wonders if maybe it is he who is afraid, afraid of going too fast, of demanding too much of her. The thought emboldens her further. She leans against him, causing him to stumble back a little before he finds his balance. His right hand doesn’t stay useless at his side. Instead, he places it in the small of her back. She can feel the heat of his digits through her layers of clothing, stoking the fire in her belly.

The spell has come out of his lungs and dangles in the back of his throat. She sees it when she looks at him through her lashes, then closes her eyes when he sucks on her tongue and her hips jump.

She’s moaning, she realises, and almost draws back. Doctor Turner turns his hand into a fist, bunching the navy fabric of her habit, holding her close.

“Don’t stop,” he growls.

She slings her arms around his neck, anchoring herself to him. She lets out another moan, and another, a litany of little gasping moans to punctuate the little wet sounds their mouths make, and the dry rustling of her habit rasping past his woollen jumper.

 _He wants this,_ she thinks. _He wants this kiss._ Is it simply raw need that propels him to press her against him, simply fleshly desire? He’s a widower, has been for over a year. Surely he misses the physical intimacy of marriage. Maybe he would have kissed one of the nurses exactly like this, if it had been them coughing up a spell and not her. She daren’t hope anything else.

But then he presses her closer still, holds her so tight to him that her breasts flatten. He lets go of her mouth and kisses her exposed throat, groaning, “Oh God, Sister, how I love you. God forgive me, but… oh, how I love you,” and why would he say that if it wasn’t true?

She opens her eyes, takes his face between her hands, and kisses him hard. The spell is in his mouth now. As their tongues touch and twirl around each other, the enchantment draws ever closer. When her tongue brushes past it, it twitches and shies back. She pretends she can’t feel it, but it is cool to the touch, whereas Doctor Turner’s tongue is warm.

He half sits on the desk. Her legs have gone weak, so she leans against him. He’s spread his legs, cradling her between them.

When the spell touches her tongue again, she winds it around, hauling it in as if it’s a worm on a hook and her tongue the fishing line. When she’s pretty sure she has a good grip, she pulls back rapidly, snaps the flailing spell between her teeth, brings her hand to her mouth, takes hold of the dangling end, and pulls. The enchantment writhes and resists, but she pulls without letting go. The ribbon grows thinner and weaker like gum until it snaps. Unlike gum, it curls up and falls apart.

It’s only then that she realises that she’s rocking her hips against him, and he’s answering with little movements of his own.


	5. Chapter 5

Little tremors of pleasure sizzle through her belly with every rocking motion. Appalled, she stops, causing the doctor to do likewise.

Doctor Turner and Sister Bernadette lock eyes.

“It’s done,” she whispers.

“Ah,” he says, letting go of her with one hand and carding it through his hair. When that’s done he lets it rest on his upper leg, fingers twitching again.

He moves away from her then, enough so that their hips are barely touching.

“Sister Bernadette, about what I said…” he starts.

It’s unbearable. She doesn’t want him to take back those words of love and endearment, just like she doesn’t want this moment to end.

 _It has ended already,_ she thinks, in which case she wants it back, wants to fall back in time and experience it all over again as if it is the present.

“Please,” she whispers.

He tries to shimmy a little further on the desk, away from the press of her hips against his. “Forget that I said them. I got carried away. I shouldn’t have brought you into this position. Forgive me, I…”

Sister Bernadette touches his wrist, maps his arm in her mind’s eye, strokes the black hair to find that it is coarser now that it is no longer wet. She should put her glasses back on so she can interpret the emotions on his face, but she’s too reluctant to do something so mundane, something so ordinary that it can’t be anything but a signal for them to return to their ordinary lives where they’re no more than colleagues.

“Please don’t apologise,” she murmurs. Her throat has become thick with an emotion she cannot name. She’s afraid she’ll cry if he keeps on talking. Already her eyes are burning. She sniffles, her lungs feeling very tight. Maybe she’ll cough up another spell. She doesn’t understand where the first came from. She needs to get her emotions under control, needs to silently contemplate everything that has happened, needs to remove herself from the vicinity of the doctor so she can’t accidentally harm him.

All of these things are necessary.

None of them are wanted.

“Sister Bernadette, I…”

She can’t stand it, and kisses him again. Their teeth clash together. She almost topples forward. He holds her tight to steady her. She cups his face, tracing the wrinkles that fan out from his eyes with her thumbs.

When they have to stop because they need to breathe, Sister Bernadette doesn’t let him go. She pushes her face against his throat, inhaling his scent of soap and cigarette smoke and aftershave, even though those scents prickle in her sensitive lungs.

Doctor Turner traces circles between her shoulder blades, does it slowly and thoughtfully. His hand is bigger than she thought it would be now that she feels it spread out on her body.

She kisses his throat, rubs her nose against his skin. There’s a little patch where he nicked himself whilst shaving. She touches it with her tongue as if she can suck away the hurt.

“I love you,” she whispers.

“I love you,” he answers, his voice thick and husky.

She remembers, then. She thought about loving him when she coughed the spell up. She shivers, causing the doctor to hold her even tighter.

 _Maybe that spell wasn’t going to harm the doctor. Maybe its only purpose was to make me act on those feelings,_ she thinks.

There are many questions, and not enough answers. Until she knows whether the enchantment was of her own making, or whether it was put upon her and let go for one reason or another, she can’t allow herself to stay so close to the doctor. This time, she managed to get the spell out of him; next time, she may not be so lucky. She doesn’t know what effect the enchantment would have had on him, either.

She’ll have to try and get a grip on the emotions and thoughts that churn inside her. There can be no control over whatever magical ability she may possess as long as she doesn’t understand herself.

But to allow such a degree of introspection she’ll have to leave Nonnatus for a while. She has welcomed the distraction of work these past few months, but if she wants to fully understand herself she’ll need all her energy and concentration. The familiar faces of her family of Sisters and the nurses will distract too much, too.

 _I’ll have to go far away,_ she thinks, the thought painful enough to make her clench her teeth. Far, far away, with no contact with those she knows, at least not initially. To separate herself from the doctor will hurt, though. By God, it may very well be the worst pain she’s ever known.

A tear rolls down her cheek, drips on his jumper. It’s one of those rough-knit monsters. It’s too big for him, and the colour of porridge does very little for his colouring. She takes the fabric in hand and bunches it, holding tighter to him than she’s ever held to anyone. She sniffles, tries to wipe her eyes on the scratchy fabric.

“Sister, are you crying?” Doctor Turner murmurs.

“I’m happy,” she whispers.

“But…”

“Please don’t talk. Just… just hold me,” she begs.

He does.

The moment of letting go cannot be avoided, she knows. She won’t see him for a long time. For now, though, there’s only him, and that is more than she could have ever wished for.


	6. Epilogue

She has forced herself not to think of him, has tried to pour all her energy into understanding herself and this new part of her that has come awake so recently.

She has prayed, and when she hasn’t been praying, she’s been sitting at the windowsill and staring at the changing landscape. Autumn has stolen over the land little by little, dipping leaves in yellow and red till the trees seem to wear golden crowns. She likes looking at the plethora of colours unfolding around her, even though she’s been painfully aware that it is the discoloration of living things in the throes of death, like a suffocating person’s face growing red and then purple.

When the letters started to arrive, she hid them away in drawers and between folded towels, hoping to trick herself into forgetting where she has left them with the randomness of her hiding places. Instead, she has surprised herself during the most mundane of tasks by encountering the creamy envelopes addressed to her in his spidery handwriting. How has he found her?

Sister Bernadette has stubbornly refused to read them, stuffing them in the drawer of her nightstand. But those letters call to her, or, more accurately, the man who wrote them does. She has denied herself the pleasure of reading his thoughts entrusted to paper like she has denied herself the comfort of human touch for so long.

 _Apart from when you coughed up that spell,_ she thinks, and grows hot at the thought. Something inside her belly coils and flutters like the butterfly who has sought refuge inside. She watches the little creature as it flies around the room, flinches as it smashes itself against the window time and time again, wishing to be let out.

“I can’t let you out. It’s too cold for you now,” she whispers. She closes the curtains and lies in bed, trying not to listen to the papery rustling of its wings. It’s impossible; trying not to listen to something only makes one painfully aware of the fact that it is there.

Her dreams turn to the doctor that night, and she wakes with her nightgown plastered to her skin, her legs tangled in the sheets, her hips rocking.

She washes herself very thoroughly that morning, trying to cleanse the sinful flesh that will not let her forget the doctor. When she opens the curtains, the butterfly lies dead in the windowsill. She takes its dry corpse and puts it in an empty match box with a pin through its body to keep it from shifting about as she slips the box in a yellowed envelope.

The memory of the poor butterfly comes to her again and again the following months until it seems decidedly unreal, like something she has dreamed or imagined.

As the trees start to look like balding men clinging to leaves that would slip between their clenched fingers, she slowly comes to the realisation that to wish for the absence of the flesh is not merely silly, but plain madness. She cannot be divorced of her body, and of the wishes and impressions that brings with it.

She has known this long ago, of course, from the moment she’s become a nun. It is only now, though, that she has realised that perhaps she doesn’t want to deny herself any longer.

She reads the first of his letters that night, her heart pounding in her chest. When she falls asleep, she dreams of him again, but there’s no hurried fondling with buttons and stays, no furtive glances to see if anyone has heard them. There is only his warmth and his scent as he envelopes her, and they hold on to each other as it storms outside.

The next morning, Sister Bernadette wakes refreshed, feeling whole for the first time in months. The wild part in her that has lain dormant for so long no longer feels like a parasite thrust upon her. She won’t deny it anymore, trying to stifle it by keeping it out of the sunlight. She has accepted that it is part of who she is.

She reads his other letters that day. She intended to pace herself, but she’s giddy with excitement, and the need to gorge herself has been overpowering.

She knows she was no longer Sister Bernadette after she’s finished them. That part of her life has come to a close. She suspects it has started dying years ago, but the moment she coughed that spell up from her lungs, she has accelerated the process of death somehow. These past few weeks far away from him have been the final throes of her former identity.

She’s like a butterfly just emerged from its cocoon, climbing to a point high and in the sun so the light can dry her wings and she can fly.

It is cold outside as she waits for him to come and collect her. Mist from the sea has rolled land inwards, coating everything with a layer of moisture and salt. Her hands grow cold as she clutches her suitcase.

When he comes, she’s almost thrust back into whom she has been. She’s skittish, and shy, flicking her eyes up every now and then but mainly staring at his hands. Hair grows on every finger.

He envelopes his hands with hers, rubbing them to get the blood flowing again, bringing them to his mouth so he can blow on them.

“I’ve been waiting for you for a very long time,” she says.

“I came as soon as you called,” he says.

She smiles, because it isn’t entirely what she has meant. She’s glad he doesn’t apologise, though.

He kisses her hand, then takes her little finger in his mouth, sucking the warmth back into it, his tongue swirling around her fingertip. He repeats the action with her ring finger, then her middle finger, taking all of her fingers in his mouth one by one till they glisten. He wipes them with his scarf. They glow with warmth. She takes hold of his lapels and pulls him close to her, resting her face against his scratchy jumper. He holds her tight, one hand on her hip, the other splayed between her shoulder blades, the leather of his gloves creaking a little.

“I love you,” she whispers.

“Darling, how I love you,” he answers, dropping kisses on her hair, smiling as he tastes salt. “Are you ready to come home?”

“Yes,” she says, and has to smile again, because she’s home already, her wings dry and strong and ready for flight.


End file.
